Unknown to many Americans, this summer a major public health crisis quietly emerged in New England. Eastern equine encephalitis (EEE) and West Nile virus, two serious, third-world mosquito-borne diseases, have circulated in the northeastern United States, killing and hospitalizing unsuspecting Americans while spreading fear in surrounding communities.
The recent outbreaks serve as a glaring warning sign of the kinds of unintended downstream effects of the mass importation of illegal aliens from parts unknown. As individuals from at least 180 different countries enter our borders and invade our communities at the hands of Kamala Harris and Joe Biden, they are bringing deadly diseases along with them.
The two mosquito-borne diseases now making the rounds in the New England region originated outside the United States. EEE has a striking fatality rate of 30 percent, while the West Nile virus is less deadly but often requires hospitalization and can cause long-term neurological symptoms. There are currently no vaccines available for either disease.
While neither disease is transmissible from human to human, the spread of the EEE virus has been attributed at least in part to recent urbanization trends, which have been significantly accelerated by the illegal immigration crisis. The 10-20 million migrants who have poured in over the last four years have brought not only EEE and West Nile, but a host of other diseases once virtually eradicated in the United States.
Reports have indicated, for instance, that illegal aliens have plagued America’s cities and communities with contagious diseases like polio, tuberculosis, measles, and mumps. As Tom Homan, former Acting Director of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement under the Trump administration, recently observed, tuberculosis “is surging again in the U.S., after being well controlled in the past, at least in part because of the large numbers of people arriving from countries where [tuberculosis] is not well-controlled.”
Tuberculosis, which spreads through the air, has a fatality rate of 50 percent when untreated—and even when treated with antibiotics, often requires up to nine months for recovery.
Between 2022 and 2023, tuberculosis cases rose by a staggering 19 percent in Santa Clara County, California, a hotbed for illegal aliens. Public data shows that thousands of illegal alien children diagnosed with tuberculosis have been released into 44 states without treatment. As of 2023, a shocking 88 percent of tuberculosis cases in the U.S. were in people born outside the country. Border states like Texas—as well as non-border states like Florida—have seen notable increases.
“The fact that the country now has tens of thousands of immigrants with untreated [tuberculosis],” Homan writes, “is a ticking time bomb for public health.”
The return of polio is significantly more disconcerting. Though many Americans are vaccinated against the disease, which spreads through person-to-person contact, it can cause paralysis for those who have not received the vaccination.
Other illegal alien-heavy urban areas like Chicago and New York have seen increases in diseases like measles, mumps, chickenpox, and whooping cough. In 2022, a year and a half into the Harris-Biden administration, a man in Rockland County, New York, was paralyzed from the disease.
To make matters worse, as one public health official put it, “When we see one case of paralytic polio, that means there are probably hundreds and hundreds of cases that are out there in the community but not diagnosed, because 75 percent of the cases are asymptomatic.”
For a political movement that prides itself on slavishly supporting the biomedical security state and shaming Americans who refuse to conform to its “expert” guidance, the irony of the public health crisis wrought by the Harris-Biden border crisis could not possibly be greater.
Perhaps nothing encapsulates this irony more profoundly than recent reports that the face of the left-wing medical industrial complex, Anthony Fauci—who has routinely ignored or otherwise downplayed the devastating consequences of the border crisis—was infected with the West Nile virus. While every person of good will wishes Fauci a full and swift recovery, Americans should see the mounting public health crisis for what it is: the latest in a long series of examples that demonstrate precisely how unserious—and oftentimes dangerous—America’s “expert” class truly is.
As Americans gear up to head to the voting booth this fall, they would do well to remember this: The very same figures who strong-armed them into taking endless COVID-19 booster shots upon threat of losing their jobs and spent years feigning outrage over unscientific “public health” protocols like lockdowns and school closures are now actively endangering their health by way of importing millions of unvetted and unvaccinated illegal aliens into their communities.
When it comes to the border crisis, it’s not just Americans’ national security that is at risk – it’s their health, too.
Aaron Flanigan is the pen name of a writer in Washington, D.C.
